Loose Leaf Notes

1. Clinton’s Vice Presidential pick, Tim Kaine, has never lost a campaign; he has a son in the military and a history of working for civil rights and the poor; he stood up to the NRA, speaks fluent Spanish, has been to Floyd more than once and plays THIS instrument.

2. Seen recently on Facebook: I have decided Floyd is like a Safari ride. This morning I came around a sharp corner and passed three horses trotting their way to Christiansburg all on their own. At lunch a female peacock visited the office

3. Whenever my grandsons and I go to the pool at the apartment where they live, there’s a group of retirees having cocktails in lounge chairs under umbrellas.  This week, as I was blowing up Bryce’s inner tube and while watching them, I thought, ‘who needs a drink.  Just blow up one of these and you’ll be lightheaded in no time.’

4. Phone booths for rent: For remote workers in London tired of working from coffee shops, one co-working company is about to launch another option: For the equivalent price of a couple of cups of coffee a week, it will be possible to temporarily rent a tiny (and private) office in an old, iconic phone booth. Inside the booths, there will be a printer and scanner, power outlets, Wi-Fi, a 25-inch monitor, and free coffee and tea. Membership at the booths, called Pod Works, costs £19.99 a month (about $30) and will give access to more than 20 booths across the city.

5. So now that phone booths are all but obsolete, where does Superman change from Clark Kent into a super hero? Watch THIS to find out.

6. The people we cast in our dreams are said to represent aspects of ourselves.  Lately, I’ve been bringing my dream work into the day by paying attention to who shows up in my waking dreams and examining what message they might reveal … Sometimes I find myself spontaneously practicing dream translation. That’s when I quietly change the pronouns of the people being talked about from “you,” “they” and “we” to “I” and “me.” I hear a whole new level of meaning that way that is usually more interesting and truthful. More  HERE.

7. A Big Dream snippet:  Taking an elevator to higher authority to do some important business. I don’t remember what happened there, but I met some good people along the way.  I kept pressing floor #3 until an older rider told me to hold the button down longer or else the door closes quickly and others can’t get it.  Later I swam down the road with Sean Penn and talked with him about “going with the flow” and how we never know how a day or life is going to turn out and often the unexpected happens.

8. Thrift shop manifestations: Sometimes I buy something that doesn’t work out but later it turns out to be a first version of something that does.

9. Recently seen on a writer’s blog:  I wrote the copy so it’s only right that I’ve stole the rights to copyright, right?

10. I can write a poem. But I don’t want to write that poem. I want to write the poem I don’t think I can write.  Writing poetry, by its nature, is to bypass the intellect, but the mind keeps wanting to go to the intellect.  So, in the practice of writing poetry, I have to keep bringing my mind back to one-pointed attention, like I do in meditation, to find the deeper essence of meaning.

11.  “What is it that makes you want to write songs?  In a way want to stretch yourself into other people ‘s hearts.  You want to plant yourself there, or at least get a resonance, where other people become a bigger instrument than the one you’re playing.” Keith Richards

12. I think people (like Donald Trump) who can’t get tanned enough and can’t see how bad their tans look have a disorder I call tanorexia.

13. Listen to “E.T. Phone Home” Ringtone HERE.  Read about Tim Kaine’s visit to The Floyd Country Store in 2012 HERE.

________Thirteen Thursday